During the summer of 2005, I attended a photography course in Prague in the Czech Republic. One Saturday we took a field trip to the town of Ceské Budejovice near the Czech border with Austria. There, one of my fellow photographers hurriedly summoned me to the scene of this moody photograph, which I have to come to call "Bike Boy." The boy played with sticks and...
"Budding Photographer?" While cleaning the yard last summer, I came across a baby praying mantis. Excited, I carefully picked him up and placed him in my wildflower area. I ran in the house to get my camera and tripod, then set up and fired off a couple of exposures.
Realizing that I wanted to get some fill light, I ran back into my house...
My family and I were visiting the Cincinnati (Ohio) Museum Center at Union Terminal during the end of their dinosaur exhibit. As part of the exhibit, they had a life-sized dinosaur outside the museum facing away from the building.
When we left the museum, I noticed how the dinosaur was facing the downtown Cincinnati skyline, so I positioned myself to frame the scene without the...
My wife and I visited Prague, in the Czech Republic, in November 2006. It is a simply beautiful city, full of color, with sculptures around and at the top of a very large number of buildings. It is a great city to walk around and just look at the beauty--and the people. We went for walks every day for six days and nights, sometimes riding the tram to get farther out, and I...
On vacation in Abaco, Bahamas, we were painting buoys we found to hang on the trees of my sister's vacation home. After just a few minutes I noticed my niece's hands and it became obvious the shot I needed to take. I had her hold her hands out so I could shoot a few frames at various apertures. The result, I felt, captured exactly what I intended. The photograph...
In New Orleans, during happier times, I was walking around the French Quarter and noticed a group of street performers. This particular man was deep in concentration; eyes closed, he was obviously "feelin' jazzy." I felt that the audience related to him and realized that he loved what he was doing. I knelt down on my knee to shoot up and slowed the shutter to...
Road trips and photography are synonymous for fun. As photographers we learn quickly that the earth is overflowing with photographic gold waiting to be mined. Whether the prospects are manmade or God-made, we are the Lewis and Clarks of photography, exploring the unexplored and discovering the undiscovered.
Consider the miniature stone monument resting calmly amid the...
Wandering around at sunrise in my new neighborhood, I came upon this wonderful pier with three men fishing. The sunrise, which silhouetted the fishermen, was behind the island of Sister Keys. The haze and colors are just as they were that early morning. I loved the symmetry of the men and the pier and their reflections in the water—they were not posed. Thinking how great it would be if they...
I took this photo while in New York City with my family in the spring of 2007. I like this image because the old buildings are reflected in the glass of the new building--the past reflected in the present. --Cindy Burrell Monte Sereno, CA
Please Read This The premise of "Talking Pictures" is that...
My wife and I were on safari in Tanzania. It was our last day at Ngorongoro Crater, the world's largest waterless caldera (a volcano that fell in on itself). It's 7500 ft so you can't see the crater due to the mist.
I finished breakfast and was going to our room to get our luggage as we were leaving shortly. I was going past...